Tag: Luke Rankin

Rankin Only Republican Senator to Vote Against Constitutional Carry Bill

Since switching parties in 2004, conservative constituents of Senator Luke Rankin have questioned whether he is a RINO (Republican in Name Only). The answer may have finally come with a vote Rankin cast in the SC Senate last week.
Rankin is completing his eighth consecutive term as a Senator, representing District 33. In 1992, 1996 and 2000, Rankin was elected as a Democrat. By the 2004 election, Democrats basically could not get elected in Horry County any longer, so Rankin switched parties and has run as a Republican for his last five terms.
Last week, the SC Senate passed a constitutional carry bill, which will allow law-abiding citizens to carry loaded guns without any training or a permit. The vote was 28-15 to pass the bill with 28 of the 29 Republican senators in attendance voting to approve the bill. Rankin, the lone Republican senator to vote against the bill, joined the 14 Democrat senators in attendance to vote NO.
Immediately after the bill passed, the South Carolina Senate Republican Caucus issued a press release applauding the bill’s passage. The release began, “Once again, Senate Republicans delivered on their promises and passed H.3594, the South Carolina Constitutional Carry Act.” The release also stated, “The People asked and Republicans listened.”

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SC House Ad Hoc Committee Begins Hearings on Judicial Reform

The new House Ad Hoc Committee to Examine the Judicial Selection and Retention Process in South Carolina began hearings earlier this month.
The committee was formed because of the increasing calls from citizens, prosecutors and law enforcement personnel from around the state that judicial reform should be a priority in the coming legislative year.
South Carolina is one of two states (Virginia is the other), where judges are elected by the legislature. The Judicial Merit Selection Commission was a key component of the inquiry by the ad hoc committee at its second hearing of the month.
SC Attorney General Wilson was asked by a member of the committee if he thought it was possible that undue influence was put on judges by lawyer/legislators who are members of the JMSC or the larger General Assembly as a whole. Wilson answered, “Yes.”
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Autry Benton’s Challenge for Senate District 33

Just over a week ago, Autry Benton announced his withdrawal from a reelection effort for Conway City Council in order to run for the state Senate seat currently held by Luke Rankin.
The announcement surprised the public, but the reason for it was even more surprising. Benton is seeking office to actually try to make a difference and help the citizens rather than the self-seeking reasons most politicians bring to their campaigns.
Benton’s announcement said he heard from Conway citizens that they were generally happy with the condition of the city. The major complaint he heard while campaigning were “about infrastructure in general and roads in particular. Benton said the solution to road problems lies in Columbia with General Assembly appropriations.
“It’s time for the necessary improvements to Horry County infrastructure to stop being ignored in Columbia. It’s time for Horry County to get a consistently strong voice for its fair share of state budget funds for roads and infrastructure,” Benton said in his announcement.
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SC General Assembly Committees Attempt End Run Around Affected Electrical Cooperatives

Sub-committees of the SC House Labor Commerce and Industry Committee and the SC Senate Judiciary Committee published notice Monday that hearings would be held this week for the companion bills to amend the rules by which electrical cooperatives may contract for power.
It is extremely unusual for sub-committee hearings to be announced on Monday and held on Wednesday and Thursday of the same week of announcement.
It is not surprising in this case, however, as officials and directors of the state’s electric cooperatives are currently in Nashville, Tennessee for the annual conference of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association,. The Senate sub-committee hearing for the bill sponsored by Horry County Sen. Luke Rankin is scheduled for Wednesday March 8, 2023 with House sub-committee hearing for the companion bill sponsored by Horry County Rep. Heather Crawford scheduled for Thursday March 9, 2023. The national conference is scheduled to run through March 8, 2023.
The general consensus among electric cooperative officials and their customers is the purpose of these bills is to force the co-ops to purchase their power from state owned Santee Cooper regardless of price. The bills require the co-ops to submit any proposed contracts for the purchase of power for approval from the Joint Bond Review Committee, the Public Utilities Review Committee and the Public Service Commission.

Bills Sponsored by Rankin and Crawford Expected to Increase Electricity Bills

Companion bills filed by Rep. Heather Crawford and Sen. Luke Rankin, in the two houses of the SC General Assembly, appear to have a goal of requiring electrical cooperatives to purchase electricity from Santee Cooper regardless of the cost.
The bills, introduced by Rankin in the Senate on February 9, 2023 and by Crawford in the House on February 28, 2023, read as follows: “A BILL TO AMEND THE SOUTH CAROLINA CODE OF LAWS BY AMENDING SECTION 58-37-40, RELATING TO INTEGRATED RESOURCE PLANS, SO AS TO PROVIDE THAT CENTRAL ELECTRIC POWER COOPERATIVE MUST SUBMIT ALL PROPOSED CONTRACTS OR OTHER PLANS FOR THE PROCUREMENT OF ELECTRIC GENERATION TO THE JOINT BOND REVIEW COMMITTEE, THE STATE REGULATION OF PUBLIC UTILITIES REVIEW COMMITTEE, AND THE PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION OF SOUTH CAROLINA PRIOR TO EXECUTION.”
Central Electric Power Cooperative provides wholesale electric service to South Carolinas electric cooperatives such as Horry Electric Cooperative and Pee Dee Electric Cooperative. It obtains most of its power through long term purchase agreements with Santee Cooper, Duke Energy Carolinas, and the Southeastern Power Administration.

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Dark Money in Horry County Politics

An increase of dark money from several opaque political action committees (PACs) over the last couple of election cycles has introduced a new dimension to politics in Horry County.
Dark money is defined as funds raised for the purpose of influencing elections by nonprofit organizations, generally called Super PACs, that are not required to disclose the identities of their donors. The use of dark money allows donors to far exceed normal campaign contribution limits while remaining anonymous.
The 2010 Supreme Court decision Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission gave rise to what are called “Super PACs”. Since that decision, these Super PACs are considered political entities which can raise and spend unlimited sums to influence elections, so long as they don’t explicitly coordinate with a candidate.
However, those lines have become increasingly blurred in recent years. It appears what has emerged in South Carolina are what could be termed ‘PACs for hire’ ready to jump into campaigns when called upon.
Of interest locally are three PACs who advocated in two local elections with negative messages about a specific candidate in each race. The candidates targeted were opposed by candidates who, I would submit, were the favored candidates of the local Cabal.

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Lazarus’ Last Desperate Gasp for a Win

During the last several months the Mark Lazarus campaign has tried everything to change the history of his previous term as county chairman and to present a false image of Lazarus as a successful leader, which of course he was not.
That is unless you count getting the entire county work force mad at you; spending county revenue on a project that should be paid for by the state and federal governments if it is to be built at all and allowing unrestricted development to outpace the local infrastructure in roads, stormwater mitigation and public services as successful accomplishments.
As a last-ditch effort to pull out victory, the Lazarus campaign resorted to a tactic that was successful for Luke Rankin two years ago. It found a PAC to spend dark money for a hit piece on Gardner.
However, instead of the outrageous false and defamatory accusations made about Rankin’s opponent John Gallman two years ago, the one against Gardner is barely a whimper.
It was much less of a thing than the attempt Lazarus, Chris Eldridge and Arrigo Carotti tried to pull to keep Gardner from taking office as chairman four years ago only speaks to how clean Gardner has been.
Four years ago, it was a completely false memo about fictional allegations all, apparently, the figment of Carotti’s imagination. The supposed source Carotti said gave him the initial information for his five-page memo called the memo “mostly fiction” after the Carotti’s attempt at being an author went public and a SLED investigation found no credibility in anything Carotti wrote.

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The Cabal or the People, the Choice for County Chairman

The primary runoff between incumbent county chairman Johnny Gardner and challenger Mark Lazarus is a contest for who will control county decisions for the next decade – The best interests of the People or the best interests of the Cabal.
Will it be Gardner, the candidate who attempts to look out for the interests of the People? Or will it be Lazarus who is funded heavily by the Cabal because, in the past, he has always worked for the Cabal?
How do you spell Cabal politicians – Bethune, Rankin, Brittain, Vaught, Howard, DiSabato, Lazarus
Who endorsed Mark Lazarus – Bethune, Rankin, Brittain, Vaught, Howard, DiSabato
That should be reason enough for citizens, who do not want to see the county entirely run by the Cabal, to know why not to vote for Lazarus on Tuesday for chairman of Horry County Council.
There are other reasons.
Lazarus endorsed Tom Rice for reelection. The citizens soundly rejected Rice in the first round of the primary.

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Swamp Closes Ranks to Support Clemmons’ Judicial Nomination

The machinations to get Alan Clemmons into the position of Horry County Master-in-Equity have skated along the very edge of state law during the entire process.
It would take a full investigation and the determination of a public prosecutor to decide whether the process actually stepped into the area of illegality, but there are enough questions to warrant such an investigation.
Either way, a study of the timeline of events, as well as the events themselves, demonstrate the way in which those in “the swamp”, (Donald Trump’s term for the political system that he said needed ‘sweeping ethics reform’ in order to “make our government honest once again”), works to advance the ambitions of the members in this group.
Clemmons won the state primary for nomination to his 10th term in office as a state representative for SC House District 107 on June 9, 2020.
On June 20, 2020, the SC Judicial Merit Selection Commission issued a media release announcing it was accepting applications for judicial offices named in the release. Included in that release was the statement, “A vacancy will exist in the office currently held by the Honorable Cynthia Graham Howe, Master in Equity, Horry County. The successor will serve a new term of that office, which will expire December 31, 2027.”
Four days later the JMSC issued a “Media Release Amended” in which the only change was removal of the advertisement for applications for the Horry County Master in Equity position. The chairman of the JMSC for 2020 was Horry County Sen. Luke Rankin.
An inquiry to the JMSC about the elimination of the Horry County position elicited the following email response, “JMSC issued a media release on June 20, 2020 announcing screening for Horry County Master in Equity (Judge Howe’s seat) and the successor to serve a new term to expire December 31, 2027. Since the new term would not begin until January 1, 2022, a subsequent media release was issued, deleting the seat from the 2020 screening.”

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Jay Jordan Another ‘Good Ol’ Boy’ in State Senate Bid

The special Republican Primary for state Senate District 31 next Tuesday presents a classic ‘good ol’ boy’ versus outsider matchup between current House member Jay Jordan and businessman Mike Reichenbach.
It will be a test of how dedicated Republican voters are to see change in the way politics are conducted in South Carolina.
House incumbent Jordan has Starboard Communications, the political consulting firm of Walter Whetsell, running his campaign, which should be a red flag for voters who want change. Whetsell is the consultant for Congressman Tom Rice and is closely tied to the Myrtle Beach Area Chamber of Commerce and its Interstate 73 project.
Another interesting fact is how the South Carolina Association for Justice (SCAJ) has provided maximum contributions to the Jordan campaign. SCAJ has its own named political action committee, SCAJ PAC, which gave the maximum to Jordan. Then, there are 10 more associated PACs, Justice PACs 1-10, all of which have the same address as the SCAJ PAC and each of these supposedly individual PACs gave maximum contributions to the Jordan campaign on the same day – December 6, 2021, according to Jordan’s campaign disclosure filings.
Eleven supposedly individual PACs, all with the same address as the South Carolina Association for Justice PAC, appears on the surface to be an attempt by an association of lawyers to circumvent the state’s campaign finance law.
Supposedly independent PACs with the same address have been funded by the Grand Strand Business Alliance, which is funded by the Chamber, to support Chamber candidates in the past. It may be technically legal but it doesn’t pass the smell test.
It should be noted these lawyer PACs provided the same type of support to Horry County Sen. Luke Rankin in his 2020 reelection campaign. That campaign and its internal associations are now the subject of a lawsuit by Rankin opponent John Gallman.

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